“The heat kills us”: what it is like to work with 50°C

Middle East and the north of Africaparticularly exposed to the impacts of climate changeexperience extreme temperatures, which does not mean that in countries like Iraq, Syria, Tunisia and Saudi Arabia there are people forced to work in oppressive heat.

Blacksmith in Syria: “The heat kills us.” In his modest workshop in the city of Idlib, in northwestern Syria, Murad Hadad forges iron between flames.

“We manufacture with our own hands. We get up early to avoid the heat”explains the man, 30 years old.

With his five brothers, they replace each other at work to perpetuate the trade inherited from their grandfather, under a canicular heat.

“My life is suffering”reads a tattoo on his forearm, while forging a fragment of iron.

He often takes off his shirt to wipe the beads of sweat from his beard and sips his tea under an old ceiling fan.

“We are in front of the fire for five or six hours, until two or three in the afternoon, and that consumes us,” says. “The heat kills us. I have six children and I can barely meet their needs. But if we don’t work, it’s not enough for us”add.

Food delivery in Baghdad: 50°C on the asphalt

At 30, Maula al-Tai distributes food in Baghdad on his noisy motorbike. When the thermometer exceeds 50 ° C, as it did at the beginning of the week, he is one of the few who ventures through the deserted streets.

“Sometimes we have 52, 53, 54 degrees. It is not normal. Nobody can bear that!”

To protect himself from the heat, he wears a ski mask that covers his mouth and nose.

Iraq, one of the five countries most exposed to the effects of climate change, according to the UN, is experiencing its fourth consecutive year of drought.

In Tunisia, the heatwave in the countryside

Munjia Deghbuj, 40, lives in the Tunisian town of El Hababsa, one of the prosperous agricultural regions of the Siliana region in the northwest of the country.

It was consulted on July 27 in a period of heatwaves as intense as it is infrequent in Tunisia, with temperatures that touched 50ºC in the shade.

Munjia changed his schedule and gets up every day at dawn to go to work, with a canteen and his food supply.

He walks about 7 kilometers to his land, where he grows paprika and watermelon.

“I get up at four in the morning, I prepare my basket and breakfast for my children. I leave on foot at five in the morning to work until two in the afternoon and return on foot”account.

“We start working very early, hoping to return before the temperature gets too high.”

In Iraq, gas canisters carried on the back

In Nasiriyah, in southeastern Iraq, it was 51°C at the beginning of the week. Atheer Jasim, 40, is a gas distributor. And when he returns home after a day in the heat, he often finds… that he has no electricity, because in Iraq the cuts are frequent and can last up to 12 hours a day.

When he feels agitated, Atheer, a father of eight children, pauses “five or ten minutes”.

“I pour water on my head, rest and go out again”, account.

He distributes gas canisters to individuals, carrying them on his shoulders from his truck. Despite refusing to slow down, he wants his children to “finish your studies”.

Cold showers for Saudi lifeguards

In eastern Saudi Arabia, the Gulf’s seaside resorts offer respite from the heat. But for the lifeguards, men and women, the days are long.

“We try to stay in shape when we work under high temperatures”, says Amani al Felfel, a woman who has worked for more than ten years in Jobar, where temperatures can reach up to 50°C. “We help us. If one is tired, another replaces it.

Taking showers is a good way to cool off during eight or nine hour work days on a jet ski or cruising the beach.

And the same at the end of the day. “When I come home I take a shower with very cold water. That relaxes me and makes me forget the heat.” Explain.

Source: AFP